TV Review – Chilling Adventures of Sabrina: Season One

TL;DR – Sabrina is a show that blends the occult with whimsy in a way I have not seen in a long while. It is a show where cannibalism and finding your one true love go hand in hand, and that is either going to interest you or put you right off.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Image Credit: Netflix

 

Review

I do not envy the task of anyone who is given the job of rebooting something that has not one but two beloved incarnations. Whether it was the original comic or the 1990s TV series, a lot of people have grown up with Sabrina being a touchstone in pop culture. So, will bringing Sabrina to a new generation create that same moment, well only time will tell, but today we take a look at how the first season came together.

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TV Review – Chilling Adventures of Sabrina – Chapter One: October Country

TL;DR – A fascinating first episode that is both full of charm, determination, and also gets super dark … it had to be spiders …

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. image Credit: Netflix

 

Review

When I was growing up there was this charming fun show on TV called Sabrina The Teenage Witch. It was this fun romp through the dangers of high school when you have to hide half of yourself away, though in this case, that half was the fact that you are part-witch. It had everything you needed in the 1990s, fun adventures, hilarious scenarios, oh and a sassy talking cat. So when I heard it was being resurrected, I was a bit concerned, and then when I heard it was part of the Riverdale universe I was more concerned because I get why Riverdale is popular, but it’s not for me. But this year we have already had one successful reboot from Netflix of an old beloved TV show in Lost in Space (see review) so I thought I would give it a look and well what an interesting first episode it was.

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TV Review – Daredevil: Resurrection

TL;DR – This is a more quiet character driven episode than pilot episodes of the past, but all that means is that the actors get a platform to shine.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Daredevil. Image Credit: ABC Studios/Netflix

 

Review

Well, we are back to where it all started, the very first entry into the Marvel world on Netflix was the first season of Daredevil all the way back in 2015. For many people, me included, that the first season is still the high water mark for the Netflix project, so there is both a hope and a trepidation when you start that first episode. Also, it felt like just last week we got a new Iron Fist, and I am wondering is it all getting a bit too much. Well, today we explore if Daredevil Season Three can be the touchstone that it was.

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TV Review – The Good Place: Jeremy Bearimy

TL;DR – Today we get to see the direction of where Season Three is going, and it is a very cool direction, while also exploring rock bottom for Chidi.

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

 

The Good Place: Jeremy Bearimy. Image Credit NBC/Netflix

 

Review

As Season Three has been going on, there has been some concern as to where the show is going, and it did feel like there was still a penny waiting to drop. This week we get to see that penny drop, right when everybody’s plans fall apart and we get to see what happens when you hit rock bottom and how you respond to that.

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TV Review – The Good Place: The Brainy Bunch

TL;DR – Season Three blasts forward at the speed of light blowing through what might have been a full season in a single episode

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

The Good Place: The Brainy Bunch. Image Credit: NBC/Netflix

 

Review

One of the things that you have to get used to when you watch The Good Place, is how quickly everything moves. Sometimes the show completely changed up its entire structure in a single click of the fingers. It also means that it does not waste any time whatsoever, and sets up premises that a usual sitcom would play out over a bunch of episodes or a whole season, and then resolve it in 20 minutes.

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TV Review – The Good Place: Everything is Bonzer!

TL;DR – It’s back and it is just as clever and fun as always.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

The Good Place: Everything is Bonzer! Image Credit: Netflix

 

Review

The Good Place, what a little gem of a show this is, a real cracker. When I first watched it I had no idea what I was getting in too, and like everyone else, I was blown away by the direction the show took at the end of Season One. To the point that even now when we are still talking about Season Three I want to be coy about what that changeup was in case someone has not seen it yet. For the last two seasons, I watched it all in a binge watch session, so I am interested to see how it plays out week by week for this season. Well with that in mind, let’s come Down Under say hello and look at Australian universities with flags in every room.

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TV Review – The Orville: Season One

TL;DR – While at first look this might have been just a Star Trek homage or at worst a blatant rip-off. Instead, it finds its feet and becomes a charming exploration of the future and the mess and opportunities that could come.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

The Orville. Image Credit: 20th Century Fox & Fuzzy Door Productions.

 

Review

I have been wanting to catch The Orville for quite a while but there was no streaming or TV that picked it up here in Australia, so I was expecting this was something that I might only get to see when it dropped on Blu-Ray. But with SBS announcing they had picked it up and would be showing Season Two I jumped on a watched the whole first season in one night, which meant that clown appeared at a very confronting time late at night. But binged the first season I have, and now it is time to jump in and see if it was worth the wait. Now before we dive in, a quick reminder that as we will be looking at the season as a whole, there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.

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TV Review – Ultimate Beastmaster Season 3 (Survival of the Fittest)

TL;DR – Another iteration and they have refined the formula even more and it works really well … also Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

Ultimate Beastmaster Season 3 (Survival of the Fittest). Image Credit: Netflix

 

Review

There are many reasons people watch Beastmaster, for some, it is the athleticism, for other, it is the face plants into the water, and for some, it is the unique format of the multi-country multi-format show that only Netflix could pull off. This is the third iteration of the series and this time the format has been changed up, and we have new contestants, new obstacles, new countries, new hosts, and still one angry beast.

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TV Review – Iron Fist: The Fury of Iron Fist

TL;DR – A good first episode that has me quietly optimistic for the rest of the season.

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

 

Iron Fist. Image Credit Marvel/Netflix

 

Review

The first season of Iron Fist was … well, it was a bit of a disappointment, to say the least. You can read all about in our past review (see here), but the TL;DR, and we are all about the TL;DR here, is that every part of the production felt rushed. It was clear to anyone watching that Finn Jones had not enough time to prep the action sequences which were the hooks that the show was using to propel everything forward. Were there moments when the season got interesting? Yes, but not enough to really recommend it. Well since then we have had The Defenders (see review) which was a step in the right direction, and Finn popped up in Luke Cage and was actually engaging for a change. All of this had me hoping that they had learnt their lessons and would take their time with pre-production this time around, and from the first episode, I think they have.

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TV Review – Adventure Time: Come Along With Me

TL;DR – This is a beautiful end to a strong series, it might feel a bit rushed at times, but it packs an emotional punch and is one of the best series finales that I have seen

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

 

Adventure Time: Come Along With Me. Image Credit: Cartoon Network / Frederator

 

Review

I grew up in the 1990s and like any child of that era, I am deeply protective of our cartoons like Gargoyles, Aaahh!!! Real Monsters, X-Men, Captain Planet, Beast Wars, and more. I also found, like every generation before me and every generation from now on, that the next generation of animated shows from the 2000s never lived up to the same standard (spoiler alert it was because I was not a child anymore). However, for me and many other people, there was one show that was the exception to the rule, and that was Adventure Time. This was a short 15-minute show based in an absurd world of candy people, post-apocalyptic imagery, annoyed lemons, and lumpy space princesses. However, it was also a show that was beautifully animated, well written, a touchstone for a lot of people, and actually grew up with the people that watched them. For me, I loved the world building that happened mostly through visual cues, and writing that was both emotionally resonate but also didn’t treat the younger audience it was targeted at as being unintelligent like so many other children’s focused entertainment both past, present, and future has/will do. Unfortunately it got a bit hard to find the show in Australia and I was left to pick it up every time a DVD got released but a couple of months ago I found that Stan had the whole series and I binged about 3 seasons of episodes, to go to the end just in time to find out the next episode was to be its last. So today I being a look at the end of a phenomenon that for many are their first real TV show love, and boy what an ending it was.

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